Betting That Bill Thompson Is Already Finished

His co-chair, Merryl Tisch, said she doesn't think there's "much appetite" for a bloody intramural war within the Democratic Party in the next few weeks to see who emerges to take on Joe Lhota in the general election.

Tisch also said she thought de Blasio had won a "clear victory" and “will ultimately emerge as the nominee of the Democratic party.”

A few pundits on Twitter seem to think Thompson will stop short of forcing a runoff as well:

The idea that Thompson has nothing to lose by pushing for a runoff is hard to fathom. No campaign $, needs to be employed after this etc
— maggie haberman (@maggiepolitico) September 11, 2013

@maggiepolitico @powellnyt As well, Thompson is To the Democratic Party Born. He's benefited well. Hard to imagine blowing that up
— Michael Powell (@powellnyt) September 11, 2013

And then here's Greg David's take on why Thompson is finished:

Bill Thompson may think that it makes sense to wait for all the ballots to be counted to see if he can contest a runoff for the Democratic mayoral nomination, but the truth is, the race is over. Mr. Thompson will be forced to concede, soon. Here's why:

His week in limbo will be crippling. The city Board of Elections won't finish counting until at least next Monday to see if Bill de Blasio remains above the magic 40%-of-the-vote threshold that makes him the primary winner. During that time, Mr. Thompson can't raise any money or win over the unions or politicians who backed Christine Quinn or John Liu.

His union supporters—especially the teachers union—won't want him to run and won't go all-out for him. Mr. Thompson finished 14 points behind Mr. de Blasio, and the odds of victory are so slim that the union leaders who endorsed the former comptroller will have to ask themselves why they would back such a long shot at the risk of alienating the next mayor. Remember, the first order of business for a Mayor de Blasio would be to negotiate new contracts with the city's unions.

Where would Mr. Thompson get the votes to come in first? Mr. DeBlasio won as many black votes as Mr. Thompson, who finished with a dismal 42% of the African-American vote, down from 70% in his 2009 race against Michael Bloomberg. John Liu's voters are likely to be de Blasio votes, which gets the public advocate to almost 50%. Mr. Thompson won't win all those who voted for Ms. Quinn or Anthony Weiner or the minor candidates.

Mr. Thompson has no campaign theme to use. Mr. Thompson and Ms. Quinn have already tried and failed to convince voters Mr. de Blasio has no record. What's left is the charge that Mr. de Blasio is too liberal and will endanger the progress of the last two decades. It might be viable issue for a Republican but not for a Democrat.

Mr. Thompson's withdrawal is only a matter of time.

I think there's a lot to that analysis.

Mulgrew and Weingarten talked a good game about waiting out the vote count - last night.

I notice we haven't heard too much from them today about that.

Even they have to know that Thompson can't win a runoff - de Blasio won almost every demographic group last night, he is benefiting from positive press today and will continue to do so for the next few days while Thompson, if he went to court to force a runoff, would not be the beneficiary of such positive press.

No, as I wrote earlier, unless something dramatic happens with the vote count between now and Monday and they find thousand of Thompson ballots in a garbage can in the Bronx, I think that Weingarten and Mulgrew will follow Tisch's pulling away from Thompson, leaving him without financial or political support for a runoff he would have a difficult time winning even if he had union support.

In any case, de Blasio seems to be adding to his total as the additional vote totals come in.

That may render all of this stuff moot anyway.